Disney's 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea Ride Is Resurfacing This Year

February 22, 1996|By Leslie Doolittle of The Sentinel Staff

Big news for giant-squid fans. Walt Disney World plans to have 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea back in action this summer.

As you might recall, Disney in-house publications announced 20K (as Disnoids affectionately call it) would be taking its final voyage on Labor Day 1994. But after ride fans gathered for ceremonial farewells and the ride was shut down, Disney officials insisted there had been a big misunderstanding and the ride was only being closed for maintenance.

In the 18 months since then, there has been considerable speculation about plans for the ride, ranging from converting it into a walk-through to adding a simulator experience to transforming it into a Little Mermaid attraction.

But Disney World's captain, Al Weiss, says when the ride comes back up, it will still have the 20K theme and existing ride system.

''We're still trying to finalize plans,'' Weiss said. ''But we will go through and do a rehab - and add a few surprises.''

Nearly 150 businesses and civic groups nationwide have banded together to promote increased air service with Japan. Florida tourism interests, from Miami to Tallahassee, are heavily represented on the group's list of supporters.

The goal of ACCESS U.S.-Japan is to urge the Clinton administration to open talks with Japan to allow more passenger flights between the two countries.

The broad-based coalition, led by former Virginia Gov. Gerald Baliles, also includes a number of airlines, the American Hotel & Motel Association, Walt Disney World and representatives from Florida - including Orlando and Miami - Nevada, Dallas, Utah, Missouri and New Jersey.

Bill Peeper, the executive director of the Orlando/Orange County Convention & Visitors Bureau, said his hope is to open more routes between Orlando and Japan.

''The idea is to create greater interest in Orlando and make fares more economical (through competition),'' Peeper said.

In 1994, the United States had 4.1 million visitors from Japan. That represented 21 percent of the international visitors to the United States.

Peeper said Japanese carrier All Nippon Airways is authorized to fly into Orlando. But the airline flies only as far as Washington, D.C., where passengers make connecting flights from Orlando using USAir.

More reason for tourism high hopes for 1996:

The Orange County Convention & Visitors Bureau says it logged 41,066 calls to the toll-free consumer travel line last month. That's nearly twice the number of calls received in the same month last year.

Danielle Courtenay, the bureau's manager of public relations, thinks the brutal winter weather was a major factor in the increased numbers.

The visitors bureau also says the just-released stats on domestic travel to Orlando for the first nine months of 1995 show a 7.2 percent increase over the same period of 1994.

According to D.K. Shifflet & Associates, the firm that tracks visitors for the bureau, the number of visitors to Orlando jumped from 24.9 million during the first nine months of 1994 to 26.7 million last year.

Despite the increase for the first nine months of the year, visitation was down slightly - less than 1 percent - during the third quarter of 1995.